Allanah
Starr
James Smith
Allanah Starr
James Smith
Allanah Starr is an American male-to-female transsexual performance artist, model and party promoter.
She was born in Cuba and emigrated to the United States at the age of five with her family. Her father had been a political prisoner. She grew up in Miami, Florida but later relocated to New York City around 1999.
She has described herself as having “always felt extremely effeminate”, but did not start dressing as a female until after high school when she attended art school. She describes her transition as an “evolvement of her femininity” since “I just changed the outside to match what I always felt inside of me. The change was purely cosmetic. I’ve always felt the same internally“.
While attending art college and before her transition, Starr developed a career as a performance artist in Miami Beach during the mid 90s. She was a club kid that became well known for her outrageous costumes, make up and performances in the local media and social circuit. She went to achieve nightclub fame
and performed for the likes of Madonna at her 32nd birthday party (which was chronicled years later by her brother in his book Life With My Sister Madonna, Gianni Versace New Year’s Eve parties at his home before his death and several high profiled events.
Allanah has also recently staged her own show in Paris titled: An evening with Allanah Starr, “The Life of a Real Woman with a fake passport”, which is a one woman show written by and starring Allanah herself.
The show promised to take a one hour comedy/burlesque/musical adventure into the scandalous life of Allanah Starr that will transport the audience from Cuba to Paris and beyond – and that she certainly did!
All photos by www.jamesmithimage.net
